Everyday People: Take Two
by Cameo Moon
Summary: Not everyone is a hero, not all mutations are extraordinary. Everyday mutants are everyday people. Just like you and me. More stories about the not so glamorous lives of everyday mutants.


It's back... more everyday people. Seems my brain just won't stop. ;-)

Disclaimer: You know the drill: xmen and the concept of mutants aren't mine. I just like playing in their world. Nice sandbox, don't you think?

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I am a walking cliché and contradiction at the same time. By day I'm a preschool teacher. By night, I'm a lingerie model. As it just so happens, neither one of these jobs are enough to pay my bills on their own. At least not enough to leave me with the lifestyle to which I have become accustomed. It's a tough world out there, but I wouldn't expect most people to understand. Who says super heroes are the only ones who need secret identities?

Both of these jobs are recent developments- I actually happened to accept both on the same day. I think fate may have feeling particularly cruel on that day, and decided to throw both my way to see which one I'd choose. The thing is, I never was very good with decisions. So I choose both.

If you ask me, I'm woefully under qualified for both jobs. But apparently those looking at me seemed to see something else.

At the preschool, I'm something of a 'go to' girl. Need a job done? I do it. Whether it's office work or stepping in for a teacher for any given day. I'd rather teach than push paper any day. I adore children, but don't really want any of my own. Teaching seems ideal: You get to watch them grow and develop over the course of the year, but you get to give them back to their parents at the end of the day. They don't tell you this, but taking care of children under five is the best form of birth control known to man.

The modeling gig hasn't exactly started yet, but I did make it through the various rounds of casting calls. Tonight I actually booked the first shoot, and signed a contract that promised several more shoots and events with them. A year's worth to be exact. Now call me crazy, but even though I'm blonde and certainly well endowed, I also happen to be 5'4" and a size 14. Oh yes, and there are the funny colored eyes. Not lingerie model material in my mind, but apparently the company thinks differently. But since they're the ones paying the rather lofty checks, I'm not about to argue. Who wouldn't love to be made over into a vixen for a day, and made the center of attention amid the magic of makeup and cameras?

Now, there are those who say I have a way of making whatever I want to happen... happen. They're not entirely wrong.

You see... I see things. No, I'm not a telepath. I don't think I'm psychic either. I just know things. People who know me, people who _really_ know me, think I'm a little bit crazy to take the chances I take.

To try to model for this, apply for that job, apply for that very prestigious university- when I'm _always_ under qualified.

What they don't get is that for me, it's not a chance. There's never any guesswork for me, not a single risk. Really the choice is simple. I know, full well and without doubt what I will and will not be successful with, regardless of how absurd it may be for me to be so.

Which is how I've ended up a preschool teacher and a lingerie model.

There's probably more to it. Maybe some sort of subtle mind control. Or the truly terrifying idea that I may have some small control over fate. But it's easier not to think about.

I'd gone twenty one years without being tested for the mutant gene. Irony of all ironies, I finally had to have it done as part of my background screening to work in childcare. The small capital M amidst the various lab reports and finger print cards was almost hard to miss. Like everything else in my life, there was no guesswork involved.

If the school director saw it, she made no mention of it, just as I had prayed she wouldn't. It would truly have been a shame to be fired on my first day. But no- I knew she'd overlook it, eager to have another pair of hands around the small school. No idea how I knew, just that simple confidence I always had when I knew something was 'right'. Along with the slight feeling that maybe, just maybe I'd had something to do with it.

As much as I seem to crave control and knowledge about the path in front of me, sometimes it's easier just not to know. I can't be certain if any of this even has anything to do with being... different. I can't even stand to think of myself as one of _them_, even if I have nothing against them in general. Even if I already knew the truth. No guess work, right?

But for a new teacher, this is dangerous ground. Even more so than breaking the morality clause in my contract. I'm certain it's frowned upon to hire mutants to care for young children, especially in well to do preschools. It's easy enough to look the other way, until one child says something in innocence about how her teacher's eyes look funny in the light, and suddenly there's a petition presented at a PTA meeting asking for your resignation.

Unlike the rest, that last bit isn't something I 'know'- just a little corner of my mind that wonders about the things it shouldn't. Things like what would happen if I were caught, and just what about me was so mutant anyway?

I liked being a teacher, even if it wasn't glamorous. But all things considered, could it really last?

Just some of the things I'd thought about on one of those late nights when I should have been sleeping, but choose to have cold pizza at 3am instead.

Oh well. If teaching didn't work out, there was always being a lingerie model.


End file.
